not loading ubuntu upgrade 12.04 from 11.1

[bangoos]

Hi all! I am a noob ubuntu user and I hope someone could help me out. Hubby upgraded his ubuntu 11.1 to 12.04 couple weeks ago. It boots up and the login screen apears with his name on it, we type the password, and we only see an arrow on a blank screen(sometimes purplish, sometimes blue).

Here's my problem. He hasn't backed it up before upgrading. I am hoping to atleast recover the photos which is very essential for a court case(someone sued us for his crappy car) and that was the strongest evidence we got.

My questions are:

1. Is it possible to rollback, degrade to our previous installed version and get our files back?
2. If not, Is it possible to fix the 12.04 version without wiping the whole system out and still get out files in it?
3. If the two choices above aren't possible, can I possibly recover my photos using some recovery software and how guaranteed it is to work?Any suggestion?

Thank you and hope to hear from the gurus soon..

PS... we have a dual boot, win7 and ubuntu(not working atm).

CAL

[mörgæs]

Hi, welcome to the fora.

'Recovering' is a term used for getting access to a file which has been deleted, which is not the case here. Your photos are fine, but the surrounding system is not.

Before experimenting I recommend that you try a live boot, which will give read access to all files on the hard drive. In the live boot, select everything of value and copy it into a USB stick.

[bangoos]

Hi, welcome to the fora.

'Recovering' is a term used for getting access to a file which has been deleted, which is not the case here. Your photos are fine, but the surrounding system is not.

Before experimenting I recommend that you try a live boot, which will give read access to all files on the hard drive. In the live boot, select everything of value and copy it into a USB stick.

Thanks for the quick reply!

Now, how do I do the live boot exactly? Sorry, have no clue about it. Thanks!